China Thread

#601
#601
volprof said:
It rarely comes to global attention, because the world is typically too busy looking for the next police shooting in America for which it can judge and condemn the US, but China has a huge problem with its ethnic minorities. Even George Wallace and Bull Connor would think they need to lighten up a bit.

Fortunately for the CCP and its private military, known as the People's Liberation Army, China has so few minorities it doesn't present a grave threat, at least not at the moment.
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it is actively trying to get rid of those minorities. Cultural suppression and destruction. Forced integration, and they have made a couple of the Uighurs (spelling) tribes foreigners even though they had been in Xinjiang for hundreds of years. just simply declared that they weren't citizens and could no longer stay. led to some of the bloodiest policing actions ever.
 
#602
#602
LouderVol said:
it is actively trying to get rid of those minorities. Cultural suppression and destruction. Forced integration, and they have made a couple of the Uighurs (spelling) tribes foreigners even though they had been in Xinjiang for hundreds of years. just simply declared that they weren't citizens and could no longer stay. led to some of the bloodiest policing actions ever.
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Unless I'm recalling incorrectly, I read in a Foreign Affairs article in its special issue on China a few months back that ethnic minorities in China, particularly the Tibetans and the Uighurs (and maybe Mongols and Manchurians to a lesser extent) are literally second-class citizens in China. Like, they're not even granted the same citizenship status by law, let alone in reality.

By some numbers (and of course the exact figures are difficult to figure out, because I highly doubt China cooperates in giving them), China also executes over a thousand "political prisoners" a year.

And this is a nation that sits on the UN Security Council and has votes regarding UN human rights policies. Run that through your brain for a bit.

EDIT: Just looked it up, and evidently they are granted the same citizenship status by law. It's just not practiced in reality, to an even greater degree than here in the US.
 
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#603
#603
volprof said:
Unless I'm recalling incorrectly, I read in a Foreign Affairs article in its special issue on China a few months back that ethnic minorities in China, particularly the Tibetans and the Uighurs (and maybe Mongols and Manchurians to a lesser extent) are literally second-class citizens in China. Like, they're not even granted the same citizenship status by law, let alone in reality.

By some numbers (and of course the exact figures are difficult to figure out, because I highly doubt China cooperates in giving them), China also executes over a thousand "political prisoners" a year.

And this is a nation that sits on the UN Security Council and has votes regarding UN human rights policies. Run that through your brain for a bit.

EDIT: Just looked it up, and evidently they are granted the same citizenship status by law. It's just not practiced in reality, to an even greater degree than here in the US.
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one of the "rebellions" over there was due to the fact that the Han could actually get police to cooperate with them while the Uighurs couldn't. it was something ridiculous where they couldn't even enter a police station without being escorted.

*edit- a person dressed in traditional Uighur garb couldn't enter any public space that the government owned or operated. which included plazas and roads.
 
#604
#604
LouderVol said:
it is actively trying to get rid of those minorities. Cultural suppression and destruction. Forced integration, and they have made a couple of the Uighurs (spelling) tribes foreigners even though they had been in Xinjiang for hundreds of years. just simply declared that they weren't citizens and could no longer stay. led to some of the bloodiest policing actions ever.
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Quite the opposite is true, they are trying to keep them. In Xinjiang the Muslims want to form their own state. They send out bombers, refuse to integrate and occasionally just start killing Han Chinese on the streets (sound familiar). This has happened several times, the police flood the town, set a curfew and shoot anyone who breaks it from either side. These curfews usually last about 2 weeks and then things go back to normal.
 
#610
#610
LouderVol said:
I will keep saying it. its jacked up how they treat minorities.
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I hadn't even heard about the riot that killed over 200 people in Xinjiang in recent years.

I guess while the world was busy scrutinizing every move of American authorities and civil society over a few unjustified cop shootings, we all must have missed China burning.

This all relates to the things we have discussed here and elsewhere (most recently in the Syria thread): the US, as world leader, will draw far more scrutiny than anyone else and, as such, requires far stronger leaders than anyone else. They can't cave in to illiberal passions and desires, simply because these are so appealing in times of great strife. In the end, they're just mere resignation - signs a society is no longer strong enough to rule and legislate itself and now has to have the authorities do it all for them.
 
#611
#611
new phrase you are trying out "illiberal"?

and yeah. the reason you hear so little is because China's control on all media over there. By the time we hear the story its been redacted so much and they get to slant any which way. Makes our "MSM" look well researched and honest.
 
#612
#612
LouderVol said:
new phrase you are trying out "illiberal"?

and yeah. the reason you hear so little is because China's control on all media over there. By the time we hear the story its been redacted so much and they get to slant any which way. Makes our "MSM" look well researched and honest.
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I wish I could take credit for the term, but it is not mine. It's actually Fareed Zakaria's. It's basically a reference to democratic, liberal societies that, for whatever reasons, turn to undemocratic and non-liberal policies/laws while still masquerading as liberal societies. Turkey is a great example. Marine Le Pen's Front Nationale is another example, should it achieve control of France, which appears more and more likely. Trump is an American example of illiberalism.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Illiberal_democracy
 
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#613
#613
Flying close to Beijing's new South China Sea islands - BBC News

really liking this journalist. he actually does these things.

China is bound by the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea (UNCLOS), which it has ratified. The law states that sub-sea structures, such as reefs, cannot be claimed as sovereign coastline, and that building artificial structures on top of them does not turn them in to sovereign territory either.
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article offers some before and after shots which shows the extent of the island building.
 
#614
#614
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#617
#617
What a pathetic government. You know you have some real winners in charge when the stated purpose of the nation's military (if you want to call it that) is first and foremost to defend the ruling party and not the people. The PLA is the world's largest private military masquerading around as a national one.

I know ruling a nation of 1.4 billion people is hard, but it shouldn't have to be that difficult, especially in a region that has not been historically unstable due to radical religious reasons (like the Middle East).
 
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#620
#620
volprof said:
What a pathetic government. You know you have some real winners in charge when the stated purpose of the nation's military (if you want to call it that) is first and foremost to defend the ruling party and not the people. The PLA is the world's largest private military masquerading around as a national one.

I know ruling a nation of 1.4 billion people is hard, but it shouldn't have to be that difficult, especially in a region that has not been historically unstable due to radical religious reasons (like the Middle East).
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Their military is a joke. I have several relatives in various branches and they have trouble getting paid most of the time, ill equipped and hardly trained. China has a core of about 100,000 that are highly trained but neither the troops or most of the trainers has any combat experience. No war = no experience = soft. They throw money at mechanization and that may help but outside their nuclear capability they are harmless. Many generals were afraid to confront Taiwan when matters got hot in the 90's because they thought Taiwan could win.
 
#621
#621
IPleadInsanity said:
Their military is a joke. I have several relatives in various branches and they have trouble getting paid most of the time, ill equipped and hardly trained. China has a core of about 100,000 that are highly trained but neither the troops or most of the trainers has any combat experience. No war = no experience = soft. They throw money at mechanization and that may help but outside their nuclear capability they are harmless. Many generals were afraid to confront Taiwan when matters got hot in the 90's because they thought Taiwan could win.
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I'm sure it's no paper tiger, but, similar to what you say, I'm under the impression that it is woefully led and staffed. Basically a glorified "social club," with lots of things that go "BOOM!" in their hands. I've heard that the corruption in the military is so bad that just about anyone, well, any man at least, with party connections can get a senior position, including a generalship. If that's not laughable, then I don't know what is. I also heard that they apparently had some nuclear drill a couple years back (which went woefully overall, by the way), where either large amounts of members of the Second Artillery Corps or of the regular army essentially went "bonkers" after just a few hours underground, collectively soiling themselves over a drill. I'm still not sure how that information ever got out to the public, but, just like us, you have to assume China has its own moles that "accidentally" get classified info out to the public. I wish I could remember where I read that report (I think it was at New Republic or Foreign Policy or something like that), but I can't find it at the moment.

So, are you like PKT and have Chinese connections through marriage, or are you of Chinese descent? I didn't realize we had so many connections to the Chinese mainland in this board.
 
#622
#622
volprof said:
I'm sure it's no paper tiger, but, similar to what you say, I'm under the impression that it is woefully led and staffed. Basically a glorified "social club," with lots of things that go "BOOM!" in their hands. I've heard that the corruption in the military is so bad that just about anyone, well, any man at least, with party connections can get a senior position, including a generalship. If that's not laughable, then I don't know what is. I also heard that they apparently had some nuclear drill a couple years back (which went woefully overall, by the way), where either large amounts of members of the Second Artillery Corps or of the regular army essentially went "bonkers" after just a few hours underground, collectively soiling themselves over a drill. I'm still not sure how that information ever got out to the public, but, just like us, you have to assume China has its own moles that "accidentally" get classified info out to the public. I wish I could remember where I read that report (I think it was at New Republic or Foreign Policy or something like that), but I can't find it at the moment.

So, are you like PKT and have Chinese connections through marriage, or are you of Chinese descent? I didn't realize we had so many connections to the Chinese mainland in this board.
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My wife is Chinese, lived and worked there for 15 years, just returned home last year.

Yes a large social club is the best way to put it. Its a society built on 5,000 years of corruption. I would say there is no person in government who does not deal in money under the table either now or in the past. Its the culture, will never change it.
 
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#623
#623
IPleadInsanity said:
My wife is Chinese, lived and worked there for 15 years, just returned home last year.

Yes a large social club is the best way to put it. Its a society built on 5,000 years of corruption. I would say there is no person in government who does not deal in money under the table either now or in the past. Its the culture, will never change it.
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Thanks for sharing. Good to know and welcome back home.

I had a Russian student out here this semester (man in his mid-40s, who immigrated to the US from Moscow, during the mid-1990s), who told me basically the same thing about Russian society. It was really interesting to talk to him, because he could provide a unique perspective on both Russia and America. One of the things he was always adamant about in class discussion and in private was how Americans are really spoiled, which he meant as both a compliment and a valid criticism. His point was that we whine and moan here constantly about everything and think that we have it really bad because a few police rough up a guy or because the government has this or that scandal, when, in reality, are society is one of the most open and transparent on the globe. In Russia, he said, your relations with the authorities, particularly local ones and the police, are almost always managed by under the table cash exchanges and, if you didn't have the cash, then you were **** out of luck. This applied to the USSR (which he thought was actually better than the RF), but mostly to the Russian Federation. While I imagine things have gotten a bit better since then, at least on the corruption end, it's still completely entrenched. It may never go away, as you say with China.

It really made me even more thankful to be an American, despite how dysfunctional we often are.
 
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#625
#625
overseasorange2 said:
Lived in China for 4 years. I loved it, as did all my male friends. The Asian women treat you like a king......
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If we keep it up at this pace, pretty soon we'll find out the whole board has direct relations to China.

I've heard the same from friends who have lived in South Korea. I imagine that has to create some tension between Western and local men.
 
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